


Spoons

by reysrose



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Chronic Illness, F/F, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-06
Updated: 2017-02-06
Packaged: 2018-09-22 08:06:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9595025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reysrose/pseuds/reysrose
Summary: “I know, ok? I know love. We’re gonna get you better.”“What if we can’t?”“Then we fight it. Together.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> I'm alive

Her brain feels like a scrambled egg. It’s the first thing she registers when she wakes up. The bed is cold and she curls in on herself, tugging the blankets tighter. Raven left the curtains closed and for that she’s thankful, because the scrambled egg feeling lends itself to a dull ache and more than a hint of wooziness behind Octavia’s temples that she knows won’t go away at least until the next day. If then. It’s been getting worse lately. A stab of pain shoots through her right knee and she reaches for it, finding it tender to the touch. One of those days. Of course. 

She dozes on and off for probably an hour after she first wakes up, her eyes fluttering open. 11:12 am. 11:46 am. Noon. Somewhere around 1:23, the last time Octavia checks her phone for the time, the door to the bedroom creaks open and a weight comes to rest near Octavia’s left shoulder. A hand tangles in her hair and pulls gently, just enough to get her head to turn. 

“You need to take your meds, love.” 

Octavia grunts in response. The handful of pills fluctuates by the week but right now it’s huge. Meloxicam, to dull the joint pain that had showed up a month ago without warning. Doxycycline, because she still can’t seem to fight off what started as bronchitis and is now lingering congestion and a cough. Lexapro, probably not enough. Something that starts with an L, that Raven can pronounce and she can’t, that’s the sickly pink color of hospital emesis basins and so small she can never remember if she took it. 

“You bring food?”

“Applesauce, the pouch kind. You can tell me what else you want once you get all your pills down.” 

She doesn’t. That’s the answer. Her crazy pills dull her appetite and she eats because someone puts food in front of her or because she’s bored. Sometimes it’s because her head gets fuzzy. Another pain shoots through her knee. 

“Come on, O.”

Raven has counted all her pills out and dumps them in her hand, watching to make sure they all go down. Octavia sucks the applesauce out of the pouch slowly and drinks some water then curls herself back into a ball. There’s a new pressure in her head and it’s making her feel funny. 

“Babe. Food.”

“No.” 

“what about mac and cheese?” 

‘Mmmmmm.” It’s a whimper, nothing more, and with it comes tears streaking down Octavia’s cheeks for no good reason other than she’s tired. 

Raven slides under the blankets and wraps herself around Octavia’s trembling body (she woke up shaking and it hasn’t really stopped yet), pressing delicate kisses to her long hair.

“Stay.” 

“Forever.” 

“No spoons.”

“I know.” 

Raven queues up The Office on the TV in their bedroom.

“I want Skins.”

“Hell no. Not when you’re like this.” 

She just nuzzles farther into Raven’s arms. It’s quiet in her body for almost two hours, and then it hits. The dizziness, the overwhelming feeling of needing to puke, and she stumbles to the bathroom and sits on the cold tile. 

“O?”

“I just need to throw up.” 

She doesn’t. She never does, just lays on the floor near the toilet with her head in Raven’s lap until she can sit up again. The Office is still playing in their bedroom as Raven tucks her back into bed and hands her a water bottle. 

“You need to eat. You want soup?”

Octavia nods. 

“And cheese toast.” 

The food makes her stomach settle and Octavia forces herself into sitting up to do homework. She should have taken the semester off, but she didn’t, because she thought being busy would help her symptoms, and now she’s facing the consequences. Her head is heavy and her thoughts are thick and slow and what should have taken thirty minutes takes two hours. Raven doesn’t leave her side, blowing through two reading assignments and something for calc three before Octavia has even finished one assignment. 

Octavia’s head starts to pound and she presses her face to Raven’s shoulder. It’s only getting harder to function normally as time goes by and the semester gets more chaotic, and she still has no official diagnosis for anything, not even whatever is wrong with her brain. Her breath hitches on a sob. 

“Shhh, baby. Shhh.” 

“It’s- it’s HARD, Rae!” 

“I know, ok? I know love. We’re gonna get you better.” 

“What if we can’t?” 

“Then we fight it. Together.” 

Octavia slides into sleep not long after that, warm and hazy and exhausted. No matter what happens, she’ll always have Raven.


End file.
